Intro to Psychology

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Who is Rene Descartes?

Dualism - how the body and spirit interact. Pineal gland = where soul and body interact.

What did Hobbes have to say about Descartes’s philosophy?

Hobbes disagreed saying that the body and spirit (mind/brain) are connect, much like Hippocrates

What did Hermann von Helmholtz discover?

That signals through the nerves do not happen instantaneously → found out using frog legs.

What was significant about how Helmholtz discovered this phenomena (protopsychology)?

• he didn’t just observe phenomena, he measured phenomena

• his approach was empirical

Who is the founding father of psychology?

Wilhelm Wundt

• Had the first psychology lab in the late 1880s in Germany

• Made the first textbook, “Scientific study of the conscious experience (1897)”

What did Wundt practice?

Structuralism

Who developed introspection and what is it?

Wilhelm Wundt.

Introspection = to objectively observe your conscious experience.

What is structuralism?

Studying the basic building blocks of consciousness (thoughts, feelings, memories) → individual parts of the mind

What are the setbacks of structuralism?

• Sample bias - educated (and rich) people were needed

• Subjective

• Can only access conscious experience

• cannot be verified (behaviour can be observed and verified)

• inconsistent results (hard to replicate introspection)

Who developed functionalism, and what is it about?

William James (also believed in introspection)

Functionalism = Understanding what the biological function of consciousness is (based on Darwin’s theory of evolution) → the mind as a whole

What is Gestalt psychology?

• “The whole is greater than the sum of its individual parts”

• “the whole” = perception

• “individual parts” = sensation

Who is the founder of the clinical branch of psychology?

Sigmund Freud

Who came up with psychoanalysis, and the unconscious mind?

Freud

Who is Anna O and what did she suffer from? How is this person related to Freud?

• Anna O suffered from hysteria (aphasia = inability to speak, paralysis on the right side of the body, disturbances in vision, hearing, and speech) with no physiological basis.

• Found that free association helped with her symptoms.

What are Freudian slips?

When the superego’s energy slips and the id’s desires are said aloud (calling your boss dad).

What are the faults in Freud’s theory?

• The theory couldn’t be proven false (unfalsifiable = scientifically insignificant)

• Placed too much emphasis on sex

What did Freud do for psychology (positives)?

• highlighted the importance of childhood

• differed conscious and unconscious thought

• how motivations can cause psychological conflict

What is the behaviorists perspective?

• consciousness is flawed

• primary mechanism is learning

• believed in classical conditioning = dinner bell (learning)

• believed in operant conditioning (punishing and rewarding behaviors causing them to be repeated/avoided)

→ the most effective form of therapy now

What is the humanists perspective?

• Believed humans are good in nature, and you have the potential to grow

• We have an intention to have positive growth (Maslow’s hierarchy of needs)

Who is Carl Rogers?

• invented client-centered therapy = act as a mirror to help someone unravel/organized their jumbled thoughts

What are the components of client-centered therapy?

• unconditional positive regard (you judge yourself so you need someone else to be that for you)

• genuine

• empathy

Give a timeline for the different psychology perspectives

Describe cognitive revolution

• placed emphasis on mental processes

• linguistics (do languages shape thoughts?)

• neuroscience (how does the brain work?)

• collaboration across disciplines

Who is Bruno Bettelheim?

A holocaust survivor who came up with the diagnostic criteria for autism.

Why is feminist psychology important?

Before feminist psychology began the default was that males were dominant, and men assumed what women wanted (which was just not true).

Who is Karen Horney?

• explain why women may have “penis envy” = men are more privileged in society and being a women meant being inferior in society

• described “womb envy” and that men cannot give life (have children)

Who is Naomi Weisstein?

She stated the feminist approach was to free psychology of all gender biases (not put women above men), to study gender differences, and re-evaluate the contribution of women (e.g. Anna Freud)

What is Multicultural Psychology?

• Explains how different events depend on cultural upbringing

• Precedents of eating disorders differ by culture

• Culture influences the types of hallucinations that people have

• How culture and environment influence perception

What does WEIRD stand for?

Western Educated Industrialized Rich Democratic

Who is Cecil Sumner?

First African American to receive a PhD in America

What does biopsychology focus on?

• Study of the brain and nervous system (sleep, sensation & perception, psychological disorders, development)

• Focuses on immediate causes of behavior

What does evolutionary psychology focus on?

• Focus on long-term biological causes of behavior

• If behavior is determined by genetics, it will be shaped by its surroundings

• What is the genetic cause of common behaviours in human cultures?

What is the McGurk effect?

Describes how what we see can alter what we are hearing, or vice versa

• part of sensation and perception psychology

What is a Tritone Paradox?

When tones contain both a higher and lower frequency → brains have a preference of which to hear

What is developmental psychology?

• developmental trajectories

• cognitive, social, emotional, physical, moral psychology

• neural blooming found during childhood and puberty